Well my wonderful, busy family, this week was amazing!
Since being companions with Elder McKay, I've had a strong testimony of tracting. Now, In over a year I hadn't been able to get in one door during tracting...i.e. nobody let us into their house/apartment when we knocked into them; plenty let us come back another time, but no immediate lessons. I still love tracting, and if nothing else, it is a sign to the Lord that you're willing to put in the work and effort in order to receive blessings. He definitely blesses you for it. Well, this week we had a ton of days that were empty and basically had a lot of time to tract. Yes! It can be a little discouraging at first, but after a while tracting becomes a blast. We had a lot of time to tract this week, and planned this week to get 4 new investigators.
Well we had one appointment set up with a potential investigator on Wednesday, and that went through. He's a guy named Greg who is from Akron, CO (it isn't any bigger than it sounds) that has investigated the church before, and I think he'll progress, but it may be slow. We had nothing else set up as far as getting new investigators, but we knew we needed to work hard. So we tracted.
On Friday, we tracted some apartments near UNC, and the first door that someone answered, a guy named CJ answered the door. He played football @ UNC, and recently transferred to play at CSU (Ft. Collins), but is still living in Greeley. He was nice to us, and asked if we could come back in 20 minutes because he had to finish shaving. We did, and we walked to a quiet part of the apt complex, and we started to get to know him and teach the restoration. I can honestly say that I know the Spirit was guiding our conversation. I was led to make analogies that I never had before (football analogies) and I knew that the first vision would have an impact on him and that we needed to talk to him about it. I was able to recite the first vision, and asked him to focus on how he felt when I did so. Afterwards I asked him how he felt when we talked about it, and he said sincerely "that's powerful." He definitely felt the Spirit, and said he feels like he needs guidance in his life, and it was such a tender mercy to be able to talk to him. Later that night he texted us and said "Appreciate u guys man good words". He's awesome!
Well, Last night we had two hours planned to tract to finish up the evening. We did so, and we tracted again at some apartments near UNC. We had some really good conversations, but nobody let us in or was interested. It was about 8:40 at night, and it takes about 10-15 minutes to get home, and we decided to tract a few more doors in the basement of the building. The first door we knocked on in the basement was a guy named Paul. He was nice to us at the door, and said he was a music performance major at UNC in piano, and we talked to him a little about religion. He said he had been going to a church near campus for about a month. Then he stopped, and looked at us and said, "You know I've actually been really curious about the LDS or Mormon religion (I don't know which you prefer), do you guys have a church here?" We told him there was and he was always welcome to attend. He said he was interested in learning what we believe, and we told him that's what we do as missionaries, and I then felt impressed to ask him if he had a little time right now to talk. He said sure and invited us in. We sat down and he gave us water (because it was burning up) and we talked about the restoration. He said that it all made sense, and that he felt like it was right. We told him that feelings of reassurance and comfort are the Holy Ghost, and we invited him to be baptized, and he accepted! It was an amazing tender mercy from the Lord, again. It was the last door of the night, on Sunday night, and we were able to touch someone's life and bring them closer to Christ. We will meet with him again on Tues.
We also got a call from some other Elders in another ward that a girl had interrupted PEC meeting to ask where the University Ward was because she had just moved from CO Springs and had a baptismal date and wants to be baptized! Another tender mercy.
I don't know what to think of all the things that are happening right now. I am so grateful that the Lord has seen it fit to have these things happen while I'm here. I don't feel like I've done much for these blessings, but I feel blessed to be a part of them.
Gary should also be baptized this week. He's doing pretty well. I'll let you know more next week.
I love my Heavenly Father. He truly loves us. There are times when the world in its shame-filled mockery tries to tell us we're nothing, and we're not worth it. Why do we keep going? Why do we turn to God? Because He does care. Why are we of infinite worth to God? Because He, the almighty creator of mountains and meadows--of mighty and miniscule--, created us. He created you. He loves you. I am so grateful to know that I have a Father in Heaven who truly takes a part and interest in my life. He cares because I do, and that is peace. Turn to Him, He is always waiting.
I love you,
Elder Logan Bryan
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